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I am pretty familiar with design problems/differences associated with the various ways that NS 4.xxx and IE.5.xxx. I have IE 5.5 and NS 4.75 on my computer for testing but will not download NS 6. Have just heard too many horror stories about problems and am not willing to risk it. I know that CNET retracted its earlier better rating and gave it a rating of 4 out of 10 as a result of numerous problems encountered by users.

Like it or not the fact is, it's out there and some people will be viewing our sites with it. Do any SitePoint members know what the known design issues are that should/could be avoided in planning design layout such as rendering of tables, css, backgrounds and such? Don't see how we can just ignore it.

Have seen a lot of complaints about it but nothing specific as to what may need to be addressed in planning a design layout.

I've heard the horror stories too, allie, but personally I've had no problems with NS6, either set up or operational. In fact I quite enjoy using it. I did completely uninstall 4.7 first, installed 6.0, then re-installed 4.7 in completely separate folder. It's run fast and smooth. Even supports a few really nice CSS properties that IE5 doesn't (in particular the dotted line property on box borders. It also seems to construct pages in a different order to IE, so half-loaded pages look kinda strange if you're used to IE.

Otherwise it renders remarkably similarly to IE5.

Still, if I was building a lot of websites I'd want to have a version NS6 handy at testing time. If you don't want to risk a normal install, maybe look at either chasing up an old pentium100 to use for NS6/IE4 testing, or maybe partitioning your drive for a dual boot . Maybe a 98 install for work and a 95 install for testing each with a different selection of browsers. Worth thinking about.

You probably have to cut all browser some slack on load times when you compare it to IE for no other reason than IE is already mostly loaded as part of the operating system. Time something like Word 2000's load time and you've got a fairer comparison.

Originally posted by AlexW You probably have to cut all browser some slack on load times when you compare it to IE for no other reason than IE is already mostly loaded as part of the operating system. Time something like Word 2000's load time and you've got a fairer comparison.

yeah..think about the integration of ie into windows..

then again....how about netscape on linux?
i guess if you want speed, ie goes for windows, and netscaoe for linux

nothing beats that

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."
-- Albert Einstein

Originally posted by AlexW Of course the flip side of that is that when IE finds a page that it can't handle and flips out, it often takes down important system processes with it, which you can't get back till you restart.

I've never had Netscape take down Explorer or Systray when it has blown up in my face.

Definitely.
But recently in IE5.5, they have this error reporting etc. haha..maybe a trick or something..it restarts the browser for you. But done'st crash the system when an error occurs

"Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world."
-- Albert Einstein